DMK moots filling cabinet posts, alliance

Coimbatore, July 24 (IANS) A day after its succession rivalry became apparent, the politically-battered DMK Sunday again met here to discuss the electoral debacle of May, continuation of alliance with the Congress and names for the two cabinet posts left vacant by its tainted ministers.

Muthuvel Karunanidhi, chief of Tamil Nadu’s major opposition party, chaired the general council meeting at textile city Coimbatore, around 500 km from here.

The rivalry between Karunanidhi’s sons - M.K. Alagiri and M.K. Stalin - had surfaced at the party’s council meeting Saturday with the latter’s supporters wanting their leader to be elevated, a demand vehemently opposed by Alagiri’s supporters.

However, it’s said the issue of Stalin’s elevation will come up Sunday, besides organisational restructuring, reasons for the defeat in the assembly polls, alliance with the Congress and land grab cases filed by the AIADMK government.

Party sources said around 25 resolutions will be passed on issues like — implementation of uniform syllabus for school students, method of facing land grab charges filed against party members, among others.

Setting the tone for the two-day deliberations Karunanidhi Saturday told the executive council members that the party cannot be destroyed by anybody and it will capture power again in the state.

Citing the electoral debacle that DMK faced after the death of former prime minister Rajiv Gandhi, Karunanidhi said the party had bounced back.

Many leaders had voiced their opposition to continuing the alliance with Congress, but senior leader Durai Murugan said speakers were turning emotional on the subject, a party source said.

Murugan said alliance decisions were strategic ones and not emotional issues.